Ahoy there me mateys
Trip Start
Nov 11, 2009
1
37
52
Trip End
Apr 30, 2010
Alleppey, Kerala, India
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
After a long discussion about where to stay we finally agreed on our first option provided by a tout at the bus stand.
The place turned out to be quite nice apart from on the way to it we got lost.
During trying to find the accommodation we ended up in a private street and the night porter for a wealthy Indian family insisted on ushering us into his employers house where the owner greeted us, called the accommodation we were trying to find to collect us and gave us cake whilst we waited.
The next day we went to look for a house boat to rent for a few days to tour the backwaters but much to our chagrin had missed most of them as they leave early and we were up late trying to find a hotel.
We ended up taking the house boat of the man who we had cake with on the first night here (such is normal life here in India).
The house boat (or Kettuvallam) was wonderful and luxurious, and we floated around the Keralan backwaters for 2 & 1/2 days doing nothing but sitting around in lungi's eating, reading and swimming.
We all got a chance to steer the boat for a bit and I lost my new ring whilst diving from the boat...doh!
We learnt to dive for shellfish the traditional way...it was night-time and we dived into the pitch black water, stuck a 7m bamboo pole in the silt of the river bed, took a deep breath and dived down the pole to the murky depths, where we had to stick our hands into the smelly mud and detritus and sift for mussels.
Great for my new tattoo.
Oh and millions upon millions of baby ducks everywhere but only a few adults...they have been busy.
We ate a lot of fish, prawns, mussels we caught and traditional Keralan food.
